GAME CHANGER | CityLax is Using Lacrosse As a Pathway to College

Imagine the composer Leonard Bernstein in khaki shorts and a ball cap on a high school athletic field in Brooklyn. Instead of using a baton to divine a Beethoven sonata from his wind, wood, and brass sections, our Bernstein, AKA John Moser ’83, is using a wooden staff with a netted pocket to produce something just as melodious from a bunch of teenage boys learning the game of lacrosse.

“Sticks to the outside, sticks to the outside,” yells Moser, weaving between squat and lanky players alike who are shrouded in shoulder and chest pads, helmets, and thick gloves. “You’re bunching up, offense. Spread out. Now quick, quick.”

“You,” he calls to a defender in a white jersey with brown legs thin as Popsicle sticks. “Get on it.”

Welcome to CityLax Summer Camp where for two weeks in July roughly 45 boys and more than 90 girls are working on passing, scooping, cradling, and throwing a rubber lacrosse ball, essential skills in a sport that is among the fastest growing in the country, according to a recent Sport & Fitness Industry Association report.

But these kids aren’t your typical lacrosse players. There’s Caleb from Guyana, Constantine from Moldova, and Robert from the Dominican Republic.